Critic Reviews

There are more things to do and collect in Road Trip than in most games, and gamers will either find this fascinating or menial. There are 100 tasks to be completed to fill the stamp book, 100 souvenir photo booths to visit to have your automobile’s picture taken, and several auto parts to add to your car. Cars can even participate in mini-games such as soccer or roulette. Fans of the Pokemon craze or other card collectors will eat up all the tasks, whereas veteran gamers may be left scratching their heads. I really don’t see how any young gamer with even a remote interest in cars wouldn’t absolutely adore Road Trip.

Had the driving sections been implemented with more style, with some decent handling and proper competitive AI in place, and were the graphics a great deal more polished, then we could have been scoring Road Trip Adventure a lot higher, probably even giving it its own review. However, as much of an attractive prospect as this will be to collect-o-maniacs, it feels like the sort of niche game that wouldn’t achieve mass acceptance, and perhaps would have looked quite comfortable on Eidos' Fresh Games label before that whole concept was completely screwed up. Frankly, on the PS2, you can do a lot worse with titles that cost three times as much as Road Trip Adventure.

Road Trip's technical aspects are very raw, but GTA3 and Vice City proved that gamers will warmly embrace a game that's rough around the edges, as long as it's it fun -- and Road Trip is constant fun, whether in small doses or extended sessions. From the pragmatic perspective of a cheap bastard, it's also one of the best values for the money on the PS2, offering easily thirty hours of gameplay for twenty bucks. At 66 2/3 cents an hour for quirky Japanese entertainment, you really can't go wrong.

Some of the tracks are okay, but poor physics and programming glitches are constant companions. Worse yet, these races run in slow motion compared to most modern racers. The music is absolutely nauseating, as is the dialogue between the cars ("Win the Gran Prix and you can be President!"). I was hoping that the wacky array of mini-games might save Road Trip, but poor control and camera problems prevent these from being enjoyable. Even the promising "car soccer" game fell flat.